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Pandering with Snowglobes

Last Saturday I found out that if you really want every kid in the building to get interested in a program, just play the soundtrack from Frozen.

Originally, I planned this program to be themed around The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, but sometime in the last month, I threw out that idea when I realized that Frozen was going to be a much more popular tie-in. I’d already advertised the program as being named, “Through the Wardrobe,” but absolutely no one was disappointed when they showed up and heard music from Frozen being played.

I had a couple tables prepped with everything needed to make a snowglobe: 30 $1 jars and 30 $1 figurines, and glitter all found at the local dollar store. (Shh, my mom purchased the figures for me to keep my budget from bulging on this. She loves to think of herself as my personal Friend of the Library. Thanks, Mom!) My figurines were Disney princesses and DC comic book heroes (though there was no Wonder Woman…of course *sigh*).

Making a snowglobe is super simple with these ingredients. You just open your canning jar, hot glue a figurine to the bottom of the lid, pour a little glitter into the jar, and fill with water. Canning jars seal up pretty well, so no one needed extra hot glue.

I’d also picked up some shaving cream and baking soda from the dollar store. When combined in a big bowl, these two ingredients become snow.

Here’s where it gets crazy.

With our snow, me and the kids went out to our deck…and had a snowball fight.

Yes, I did have a snowball fight at the library in the middle of the summer. I’m a wizard.

Things…got really messy really quickly after that. Powder-y remains of the snow were tracked all over the building, so lots of people witnessed me sweeping up after the kids all afternoon. All the patrons passing by me, broom in hand, asked me what happened and when I explained, they were amazed. One even said, “I love to see a well-loved library. You keep up the good work.”

After the chaos of last week, I felt like a rockstar finishing out that way. We had 18 kids come, so I passed on the leftovers from my program to another branch that was interested in using it all for a drop-in craft.

If you read this and think, “I’m just crazy enough to do that too!” Here’s what you need:

Estimate one box of baking soda, one container of shaving cream, and one big bowl for each 4 kids.

Try to remind everyone before starting the program to get all their library business out of the way first. That should reduce clean-up.

Prepare a powerful hose, or enlist volunteers to help you sweep up. Baking soda dries up into a powder, even with the shaving cream added, so it comes out of everything very easily.

Don’t wear your nice clothes. The kids will want to play with you too!